Recently a friend and collaborator Harry Jarrett Jr.posted his thoughts about why he likes a denomination my wife and I have been members of for the past several years.  Although our historical family tradition is Mennonite, and we both went to Mennonite Highschools CD and LMH, but, I have not been actively involved in the Mennonite church as a larger denomination/network or agency until recently.

A brief  backstory.

As a family, my spouse and I  have worked in the space of evangelical mega-church, after which we spent half of our adult life not going to a formal church, but started a home group called Livingroom during our recovery from Church. After some major life transitions we become active member/participants in a local congregation where we have found support and friendship for our journey and a space to belong to God’s Body, the Church,  even I don’t “fit in”, (in the more traditional sense of the word).

The reality of the work I have been invited to participate in would not be possible with out the connection to the Church and it’s agencies.

Being Church Again.

Here is how I have participated with this denomination called Mennonite Church USA

I was invited into leadership development relationships through Franconia Conference and given oppertunities to apply my ideas and experience through leading seminars and speaking.

Later, I was invited to apply experience and learning for a missional experiment  through Doyelstown Mennonite Church called

This past year I have listened and shared thoughts on a Transformational Team through Eastern Mennonite Seminary where I am continuing my adult learning in Leadership from an Anabaptist perspective to graduate in 2012 with a M.A.

In 2013 I will be apart of implementing innovative ideas for an interactive experience through media/tech at Mennonite Church USA Convention in Pheonix Arizona.

Possible Reasons for Church

A gift this network of people, churches, agencies and higher learning.

Relationship with a broader community of faith acting out of a narrative of peacemaking and reconciliation in our world.  This has transformed my understanding of self, others and mission.  I have become a player in a theatrical story taking place in our world for the work of God, where people with out food, share a meal with people who live in abundance.  I can invision what Jesus talks about in the gospel being repurposed through an actual Church in a where society has removed themselves from the system of doing church on a large scale.  I imagine from my own experience this is due to the amount of corruption, and injustice done in the name of God, Jesus, Crusades where ”Jesus”, “God” are used for personal/political gain.

I can imagine an actual body of work over the past 1500 + years of being Church reconciled in our local communities and global society where acts of violence/injustice are actively confronted through practices of resiliency and peacemaking from a broader perspective  of faith.  This is due to the STAR program I participated in last year on a hilltop in scenic Harrisonburg Va. through Strategies for Trauma and Resiliency .  Recently a Nobel Peace Prize winner winner was a graduate of this institution  and applied her leaning from the Center for Justice and Peacemaking to her context in Africa.

The greatest part of being apart of Church, is the sense of participating in the narrative of God’s love in our world that confronts our own fears and inabilities to understand others on a  healthy and functional human level.   This grand story in scripture and live out through history, be it unreconcilable at times, invits us to particpate in practical ways in our relationships with self, family and friends.  Our indavidual story has the chance of getting caught up in the epic journey of holistic spiritual transformation in order to actualize a self that can make a mutual benifit in society.  I have witnessed the results and outcomes in my relationship with my spouse, daughter, extended family, community, colleagues, and a cohorts of learners.

What is your expeirence with Church?

In what ways are you making meaning out of Church?

What are your reasons for or against Church?

The ability for the Christian community to read this book and find themselves in the story provides a possibility of transformation not unlike the gospel.  It is in the story we find hope, not in a perfect life lived.  There is no great stage to attain or success to measure up to by the end of the book.  These are idols in the mirror of a man broken by his own addiction and humanity.  There is no idol greater than the ideal self projected onto others.  This story allows the reader to find his/her own shadow and be visited by Christ great love.  Christianity has the power to reconcile one to another, when one of the great hero’s tells a story that opens up broken spaces in our humanity.  Providing room for the love of God to illuminate our own limited expectations and understandings of God.

As I read “All is Grace” I found myself crying, laughing and hoping again in the Christian identity to go beyond our constructs of truth, function and form.  We are created beings, shaped in the image of God.  Our great joy is the participation in the story of reconciliation.  When this story becomes true we can live loud the good news in the midst of our brokenness and humanity.  He answers the great questions of why fall back into addiction and brokenness after your encounters with “Abba’s love”?  with his final statement, “these things happen”.  This book is a journey not an answer.  And like many great memoirs it captures the vary nature of the human story.  It is with great anticipation I recommend this book for all those who want to encounter the love of Christ through the story of a broken and loved man.

We all have worldviews, which our shaped by our education, upbringing and experience.  We all search for meaning; I would like to suggest that we are emerging into a space of creating meaning through the interconnected reality of the digital communication between individual and community.  However, with out a local contextual expression of your “self” we can be lost and diluted by our own grand narratives at play in our subconscious and conscious mind.  It is only in the communication between the other people we begin the sacred act of transformation.  No longer can I just hold onto my particular worldview I become shaped in the transaction of ideas, empathy and relationship.  This is my ultimate goal: that my simple, small being, would interact with the grand narrative of Creation through the interplay of a local and global intercultural community.  The community I am passionate about lies in both the academic, social, and religious enterprise: along with the convergence of inter-cultural behavior and the creative act of communication for mutual benefit.

There is a growing concern for the social entrepreneur to leave the nest of security in celebrity or heroic behavior in order to act in mutually beneficial ways with the other.  There is a need for an emergence of brands and enterprises, which can risk the bottom line enough to innovate new categories of communication and exchange of goods and services.  The power structures at play with in our global social society are demanding us to give up control in order to gain informational insight into the picture of those who are not in power.  This is an opportunity for growth and transformation of our world.

Responsibility denotes ones own ability to accept, absorb and learn from their decisions.  This often takes place when a person finds themselves at a “crossroads” in life.  A traumatic incident may have taken place, for example, a death of a loved one or loss of job.  These incidents evoke a stress response in the neurological system, causing systemic results in the mind, body and spirit.  As the person goes through the transformational process of full acceptance of ones own behavior or situation in life, they become responsible for their personality.  (This could take years, decades, a life time or never at all.)

Here is my perspective:

People in western Society don’t like reality.  The acceptance of who they are, because we are really good at developing extensions of ourselves.  Ie, business, blogging, inventions etc. Our extensions allow us to analyse and distract us from the core of who we are.  The real problem facing the world today.  We can be all connected virtually at any moment, and yet we have digressed in our own understanding of our responsibilities.  We can live in alternative realities of what it means to be human, male, female, black, white, successful, etc.

We tend to accept the illusion that we are above culture, that somehow our understanding of ourself comes from a higher power.  As someone who’s worldview and belief system is shaped by my identity in a Anabaptist/Mennonite faith tradition.  I do believe in a higher power (God), however, in my work with Christians, I am finding an unwillingness to accept our own limitations, as well as possibilities for greatness.  (The word greatness needs work, I am not able to go into for this blog post.)

For example: I have notice this from my own personal development and work with organizations and individuals.  There is a tendency to slip into the comfortable understanding of self as just made up from the values of our culture.  This is just one small example:  Our culture values what we buy, because our broader society values the consumptions of goods and services.  Therefor, my identity becomes shaped by where I shop, who I support financially etc.  This is not wrong, but it does not make up the some of all our parts a citizens of the world, in our own particular tribe, family and business.  This can be found in where we live, the church we go to, the places we shop, and the name on our bank account.

My suggestion is we all take small steps toward responsibility for our personality.  We must stop thinking we can change the world and start believing we can be apart of the greatest transformation to ever happen in human civilization.  I am talking about the illumination of all mankind.  That we are all connected and who I am, what I do actually matters.  It does, just look at your neighbor, or the person who washes the dishes at the restaurant you frequent.

Over time, a long period of time, individually and collectively we can have a reorientation of character.  We can be transformed by the renewing of our minds – scripture.

Here is the question:

How are you oriented right now and what are small steps you can take to reorient toward responsibility today?

According to wikipedia‘s  definition of Character Orientation:

Receptive Orientation: People who are passive.

What are you asking from someone that you can be responsible for?

What can you do right now to become responsible?

Hoarding Orientation: People collect and keep stuff they don’t need

What are things you do not use you can get rid of this week?

Marketing Orientation: Who are you trying to sell?

To take a step today, I would suggest asking the question:

What/Who am I investing in?

This blog was inspired by my investment in my own personal understanding and responsibility for decisions and outcomes I find less desirable.  We all have a shadow mine tends to be narcissistic, impulsive, unfocused, rebellious, undisciplined, possessive, manic, self destructive, and restless.  This is true, just ask my wife or colleges over the past 10 years.  However, with that said I have a radical belief that we are living in and out of a story.  My story is not over, but it has meant taking responsibility for my personality. Understanding my strengths, my unique contribution to my wife, daughter, family, friends, colleges, partners, congregation, community and world.

If you are feeling in transition this post is for you.  Welcome to the new normal, welcome to the new way of being in this world.  Where we can finally face some of the the lies which we inherited like “security” and “wealth” and flip them on their heads with a radical simplicity.  A hope in something more than the individualistic, consumer, American “dream”, which has failed us all.

To understand failure and its power of transformation, I believe one needs to fail their expectations and live in spite of fear.  The driving theme in our human narrative is the fear of death.  Overcoming our greatest fears, is a process of living well.

“What do you do?” is in my estimation the toughest question for a person in transition.

May I suggest a better question for people in transition, “What are you learning?”

Here is what I am learning:

1. We need new metrics of success.  (Money, power, fame will not work in this new world we are living in, where the curator of information and the promoter of others, becomes the new CEO, because last I heard the salaries aren’t that good

2. We need community more than we need commodities. (When I use the word community think of this analogy.  An alcoholic steps into a room and this persons friend hands them a diet coke while entering a party.  Community empowers the person, it does not enable destruction.)

3. There is are new social spaces emerging. (We have the white noise of social space vibrating our phones and filling our minds with activity.   But People who make real face to face human contact happen, will yield the new currency.)

4. Empathy can take the lead in the “new economy”. (I am biased, I have a passion for faith communities specifically the tribe I belong too.  The reason the congregation can lead is they can design mission around people projects, not buildings and salaries.)

5. At the end of my life, I will be thankful for this year. (I am overjoyed with a thankfulness to the people who have allowed me to commit and share with.  Each week I become affirmed in my faith as a way of life, not just a belief.)

One year ago I stepped away from a company I co-founded with my father, wife and a couple friends.  I did this to reclaim my life and it’s purpose. I did this to integrate a life lived on mission with my wife who is my greatest partner and friend.  I did this, because I have a daughter and if I hope for her to live in a way that is abundant and meaningful than, I better start living with intention.

Step 1 – I went back to school to finish a degree in leadership.

Why did I go to Eastern Mennonite Seminary?

The Anabaptist Mennonite narrative is my grounding story.  They are my faith community and were instrumental in bringing me back to life.  I hope to ultimately work with leaders in activating their God given dreams for this world on the mission of reconciliation and transformation.

Step 2 – We started a “company” Why?

This time we designed it a little differently by founding a Talent Collective.  I have a gift and I want to share it with amazing people, companies and organizations.  There are better ways to work and www.myohai.com is just one of them.

Step 3 – We named and joined a movement

There are 1000′s of movements all around us, I recommend naming one or joining one you identify with.  I connect and collaborate with www.ohipeople.com and www.anabaptistnetwork.org.

In the past year I have had the opportunity to share my gift with inspiring people doing amazing work in business, NPO’s, community development and churches.

Thank you for all those who have given me oppertunities and encouragement over the past year.

When we sit down at a table with a person unlike us, we are engaging in the work of reconciliation.  If we dare to break bread and share a meal, we may find ourselves in the midst of transformation.  Similar to the early followers of Jesus in Rome or Corinth, pre Christendom.  Before the empire held the church to the center of society and Christians settled into the comfort of an earthly kingdom.  At the time after Jesus’ death when followers were opening their homes to passers by, on their way to the city.  The message of Jesus was shared during a meal, in a home or in the market place.

The call we hear from Paul in the scripture today, is to be proud, in verse 12, of the people who are persuading others to live a radical lives of following Jesus through the mission of reconciliation.  Here we see the church as the message of reconciliation to the people of Corinth.  Christ’s love is the compelling impulse in life to act out radical faith with others in our neighborhood.

We may hear this radical call, that God is all ready reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting peoples sins against themselves in verse 19. (pause) And yet we live in a world where horrific acts of injustice, violence, and corruption are done.  We may ask, how could there be a God, let alone a reconciling Christ when these things take place.  May I suggest it is precisely in these moments when we hear the call to be present in a place where we are ambassadors of reconciliation?

(BREATH)

Recently, I had the opportunity to serve alongside Jenifer for 3 evenings of coffee and conversation in Souderton.  These took place in a coffee shop in Souderton during the season of Lent.  During the conversations with people in the neighborhood we discussed issues of faith from the themes of the Sermon on the Mount.  This sermon is when Jesus calls his followers to see the kingdom of God in an upside down reality.  Where those who mourn are comforted and those who are meek inherit the earth in Matthew 5.

It was in these moments I witnessed an ambassador of reconciliation in a Post-Christian society.  Where Jenifer set the table of intimacy and vulnerability through a posture of compassion to the others in the room.  Trusting the spirit of Christ in all of us, she invited the other’s to share around broken places in their lives and this community.

Then four weeks ago I had the opportunity to witness Jenifer again creating hospitality through her presence in a block party in down town Souderton.  Where a group of radical followers of Jesus had the audacity to believe celebrating a town was in and of itself a generous act of hope.  Where over 1000 neighbors jumped on blow up kids games, broke bread with hotdogs, shared the cup with rootbeer floats and sat down at the table during a local concert and art show.

Someone asked me after the event, called Celebrate Souderton; the block Party.  Did you have a message?  Perplexed by the simplicity of this question I said no…  Unsatisfied with my answer I was reminded by Jenifer that the event was the message.  That simply being present, offering a gift, and our best art is an expression of our faith in a reconciling Christ through the people of God.

What I see in Jenifer Erikson Morales, is a follower of Jesus much like the one Paul is asking the listener to be proud of for their visible acts of reconciliation when no one is watching and no one is paying for their service.  I see a willingness to move from the center to the margins of society where the people with out a voice are given space to be heard.  For example the work she does with local mothers in her neighborhood.

At this time in society when churches are realizing they may have lost their prophetic voice due to the shift in the way people perceive Christianity.  We have a leader emerging with a deep trust in the one who’s name is Jesus, the one who invited his early followers to walk with him from town to town, until he enter the city of power, where his message threatened the very system of control.  Calling people to follow Christ, so that they may have life, reconciled with God now and forever more.

I see Jennifer as a leader in the Post-Christendom church when we begin to rediscover hope- a vision of what society will be like when the kingdom is fully present-and advocate on behalf of those who are oppressed by the current system.

“A church that knows it can no longer control how history will turn out, what people believe, or how they behave can revert to its original calling to bear witness to the gospel.” Stuart Murray

Lately, in the Christian thought community found through online media platforms like twitter and blogs, people have been getting excited about the possibility of heresy.  A word used to describe people who do not toe a particular orthodox line of thought or belief in the more evangelical stream of Christianity.  There is a lot of fear in the christian community.  All though I am a “member” in tradition and heritage, I often find a lot of the stories, being followed believed and told.  Unchristian from a kingdom perspective.  This perspective is represented well through the teachings of Jesus in the Gospels as well as modern day theologians like N.T Wright and pastors like Greg Boyd.  There is a kingdom reality to our life, a space of trans-formative justice where the kingdoms, powers of our world are turned upside down.

There is a place where a table can be physically made in the midst’s of suffering and great loss.  where a community is invited to eat, a prepared meal is shared by the host and the hosted.  This is the kingdom message/story I hear in my imagination.  The one that is called out of many people from different perspectives and world views.

This week after the horrific news of a murder of the girl in my town.  I found myself protesting the narratives coming through news outlets and the broader community.  People naturally wanting to keep their kids off the street and lock their doors, so that the violence will not happen again.  Although, I can sympathise with the response and any emotion felt is a necessary part of a grieving community.  However, I would like to suggest an idea that the merely locking of ones door and becoming more vigilant, like a recent facebook post said, “I believe taking the community back means we all become responsible gun carriers,” is the wrong action to take and will not accomplish a shared desire to make the community a safer place to live, play and ultimately belong.  I would like to suggest this will actually have the opposite effect in our community.

This belief is not only grounded in a restorative narrative of Christ’s kingdom through the gospels, it is also grounded in leading restorative justice research and practice.  My belief based on the stories I follow and share is that we prepare a table for the other, the one we do not know, the one who scares us.  We sit down, we break bread and we listen.  We listen to the great terror in our minds, hearts and body’s.  We then invite the other to wash their hands.  As they lean forward to wash we offer a towel.  As they begin to dry off their hands we hold out some bread.  When they break the bread, we offer them a cup to drink.

I have not used the word “calling” in my vocabulary till recently, due to the many meanings it has had in my life.  It used to mean to me that there was this specific job, role, task I was meant to do or person I was meant to be.  Now calling is more about the fullfillment of a longing that ecompasses both my intellectual, spiritual and emotional understanding of myself in the world.  I fullfill my calling primarly in the small things, like doing dishes, laundry and spending time with Andrea, my wife, June my daughter and the relationship extenstion that keep me grounded.

I need grounding in my life, because I am a dreamer and impulsive.  Expressing myself as a whole person in family and society comes with its challenges.  Number one challenge in my life is developing a carreer, profession or the word I like to use: vocation.  The word vocation takes into account the small things I do every day to fullfill my calling.  I have a deep longing to be a husband, father and worker.  A person who serves God in the profession of helping people live their calling through their business, ministry and work.

Five months ago Andrea and I went a way to a small house in New Jersey to find clearity on how we would live out our longings as parents and workers the upcoming year.  After seeking counsel from wise leaders who know our passion, hopes and dreams we started a talent cohort to do our work together in community with people who have gifts outside our capacity.  This provides a level of accountability and a structure to work with small business leaders, Ministries, and Non Profits.

Andrea and I failed at our first effort of working together. Largely because of my ego and in ability to take her lead where she is strong.  Thankfully the business we helped start continues to this day and it doing well.  Removing ourselves from structures that did not support our strength was our first step in developing our vocation and fulfilling our calling.  We have just begun and it is a challenge and rewarding in our personal relationship.  There are many different opportunities we have because of this decision, but it has meant letting go of the american dream of owning home, property and stuff.  We are privilege to even get to decide that we will “sacrifice” those dreams for a more holistic dream of living our calling.

How do you celebrate your way of life?

How do you understand your way of being in this world?

There has been a stream of the Evangelical message that promoted a fear of going to hell in order to be “saved”.  We can all relate to fear and a way to communicate a message is by relating to an audience.  There is fear of dying, fear of being rejected and fear of failure.  I can’t help but applaud Rob for facing the fear of loosing his evangelical platform to speak about an inclusive God of love.  Where love wins and people choose the way of compassion, generosity and peace making.  People choose heaven right now.

It seems like people will engage when what they see from Christians is authentic and connecting with a deep longing.  My gut says the movement of Christ message is happening both in and outside the church building and people are looking for ways to be involved in what God is doing in the world.

The revolution is the leveling of the playing field.  People want to offer their best to the world and they are tired of being told to wait until the powers that be are ready for them to serve.  This is heard in the global voice of young educated leaders in Egypt who used social networks to organize, communicate and create change in their country.  This revolution is taking place in the market space of philanthropy, social entrepreneurship and and it is even taking place in and around the American evangelical faith communities.

This can be witnessed in the rise of tribes who support the release of a new book by Rob Bell.  This can also be viewed as a grand marketing platform which get’s an organic trending topic on twitter and thousands of comments on blog posts.  I think of it as a sign of what people of faith want.  They want to bring their “calling” to the for front of the way they live.  Not in a dogmatic or forced way.  They want to be liberated and able to lead with their whole heart.

As a recovering Evangelical I found myself liberated in my 20′s by the ability to enter into the questions people like Rob Bell, Brian McLaren and now early Anabaptist voices through class’s and Eastern Mennonite Seminary.  The historical narrative of faith expressions connecting people to the teachings and way of Jesus is and will always be transformational.  The fact is we do not “know” intellectually as we once thought we did and this scares a lot of people.  It is easy to sell Certainty, people want to know if they are in or if they are out.  If it is not as simple as hitting a “like” button on my computer I may loose interest a leave your church for my television or go to a golf course.

As a person who has just emerged from many years wrestling with my identity as a “christian” and how I live and work in the world.  Recently I have started working with local leaders on a faith experiment this has helped shape the way I feel I best serve the needs of my local community.  I am both a leader and a listener.  I am listening to the passions of leaders in and around the church and I am leading by creating platforms for people to collaborate and bring their inner desires to the community.

We have asked the question of what it would like like to work together with other faith communities, business leaders and artists for the common good of a community.  We do this through collaboration and generosity.  You can learn more about the emerging platform for generosity at Open Hand Initiative.